This Week In The Pac-10, May 7: Baseball schedule, rankings, standings and results

ASU had plenty to bump about Tuesday night.Photo by Cheryl Evans/The Arizona Republic

The Arizona State Sun Devils came into Tuesday’s non-conference baseball game having won six straight. The Arizona Wildcats entered the contest having lost four of six. This time around there were no surprises as ASU exacted some revenge to the tune of 13-1.

Both schools are taking a break from Pac-10 play this weekend before meeting in Tucson to decide the season series starting May 15. Here’s your complete TWIT-Pac schedule:

#23.2 Cal (27-15 / 11-7) at WSU (22-17 / 6-9)
The Bears are the all-or-nothing team in the league. They have three Pac-10 series sweeps and two Pac-10 series swepts.

#17.8 Oregon (30-15 / 10-8) at OSU (21-17 / 4-11)
The Ducks are ranked and the Beavers are not. That has to really chafe OSU fans after their recent ascent to nouveau-baseball-power status.

#12.4 UCLA (31-10 / 7-8) at Washington (25-19 / 8-7)
There’s no way the Bruins expected to be swept by ASU. I can’t imagine the Huskies expected to sweep Stanford. Don’t even try to guess the outcome of this one.

BYU (19-23) at #2.6 ASU (39-5 / 14-4)
The Devils are taking it easy this weekend and only playing two games. They must be worn out after scoring all those runs against Arizona.

Cal State Bakersfield (19-23) at #23.2 ARIZONA (29-14 / 9-9)
CSB is an independent, which means they play a lot of road games, which means their Roadrunners nickname is appropriate. Bakersfield split four games at Washington State earlier in the season but hasn’t won a road series all year.

#30.8 Stanford (23-17 / 10-8) at Long Beach State (20-21)
This season LBSU has played Oregon (0-1), UCLA (1-1), Arizona (2-0), USC (0-1), Washington (1-2), and OSU (2-1). The Dirtbags have more Pac-10 wins than the Beavers and Trojans.

Utah (19-21) at USC (20-24 / 5-13)
After taking care of Arizona the Trojans beat a ranked Irvine team on Tuesday. They’re not going to take it anymore.

An interesting note from Tuesday’s thumping in Tempe is that Nick Cunningham started his first game for the Wildcats. This seems to indicate that Bryce Bandilla’s season has come full circle and he is back in the closer’s role. Can the Thrilla find success at the end of games or is he best suited for life in the middle?

If you are Arizona you need to take these Bakersfield games very seriously. The UA badly needs some wins. The Wildcat hitters badly need to see the ball flying off the bat. Take advantage of a road-weary team and post some double-digit scoring games.

The next nine games are at home. It’s time for the Cats to get better.

If you’re wondering where those cool one-decimal-place numbers in the schedule came from, they’re each team’s average in the five pools:

ASU won all three at UCLA. Scores: 5-1, 6-1, 12-3
Place the order with the engraver; the Sun Devils are going to win their 4th straight Pac-10 championship. Good hitting put a beating on good pitching in L.A. The Devils had seven different innings with multiple runs.

Cal won all three vs. OSU. Scores: 11-3, 14-4, 9-3
The Beavers are now missing both axles.

Oregon won two of three vs. WSU. Scores: 2-3, 6-0, 6-1
When your Sunday starter is 7-0 with a 2.87 ERA you know you’ve got a good pitching staff.

USC won two of three vs. ARIZONA. Scores: 6-0, 7-5, 7-9
The score in the first game was Kurt Heyer’s record before he faced 1-7 Andrew Triggs.

Washington won all three vs. Stanford. Scores: 4-2, 8-1, 4-3 (15 inn.)
The only thing worse than being swept is being swept after losing the third game in 15 innings. It’s like working five hours of overtime and then having your paycheck bounce.

Game times for the Wildcats are 6 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and 12 noon on Sunday.